Here in the dark of this night, i thought of this piece i wrote years ago. Don’t know why. Been thinking about folks and how we seem to thirst to hear about other folks being on the dark side while we ignore we too have been to that dark side. i guess that’s it. i have been to the dark side. Still go there on a too frequent basis. Figure we all do once in a while unless we aren’t all that bright and ignore it. Sad. The dark place ain’t all that bad if you take it for what it’s worth. Look to make something good out of it. Let in a little bit of light. i hope, if you read this, you can catch that beam of light shining through.

the dark side of the hill

I was walking down a small-town street
a cold, harsh Sunday
when from a corner of an alley
a huddled, gnarled old man
leering from under a soiled and torn fedora
spoke to me:

“I have been to the dark side of the hill,
my boy,
“I can tell by your gait,
you are headed there;
frivolity and adventure
are what you seek,
but it’s not there,
son.”

I paid no heed, passing away
from the old man,
continuing to pass through
the sun-reflected snow
to the zenith of the hill,
and on.

the wind is biting
on the dark side of the hill;
there is no sun
to disperse the cold.

now, on some small-town street
on a cold, harsh any day
in the corner of an alley,
a huddled, muddled, gnarled old man
waits.

i have been to the dark side of the hill;
my gait is altered.

For those of you who might have missed it, i am proud of being called a mariner.

Captain Frank Boyle gave me that compliment just before i left USS Yosemite (AD 19) as his executive officer at the end of April 1985, telling me i wasn’t just a surface warfare officer, i was a mariner.

It was a bit bittersweet as it turned out because the Yosemite was my penultimate Navy assignment and my last at sea tour. i have often seriously said if they would let me drive steam ships, i would still be at sea.

i had read Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” in Major Tom Harris’ English class at Castle Heights. i was enthralled but really didn’t understand why.

It took a while for me to feel like i was a mariner. The sea clearly spoke to me in 1963 on the USS Lloyd Thomas (DD 764). i was not ready, i had my mind on partying, girls, and somewhere in there, sports writing, but i knew  the sea and i had a heart felt conversation. Then when i was at Middle Tennessee, Dr. Bill Holland gave me a depth of understanding of Coleridge’s mariner and that albatross. Holland also became a good friend.

i got close to being a mariner on my first ship, the USS Hawkins (DD 873) under CO, Captain Max Lasell and XO, Lieutenant Commander Louis Guimond. But i only rode ships on my next tour and got out with sports writing on my mind. Faced with the responsibility of supporting my daughter on the way and her stay at home mother, i reconsidered , remembered my love of the sea, and returned to ocean’s deep.

In my nine months on the USS Stephen B. Luce (DLG 7)  with Commander (later Admiral) Richard Butts at my side, including four months on a Mediterranean deployment, the sea and i had another meaningful conversation. i felt i had become a good conning officer, a good officer of the deck (OOD) and a pretty decent Naval officer, but i wasn’t yet ready to call myself a mariner.

The Luce tour earned me a spot in destroyer school en route to department head tours. As Engineering Officer, Chief Engineer, or CHENG on the USS Hollister (DD 788),  i passed the test for being a ship’s engineer. But engineering does not a mariner make.

It was the next tour, First Lieutenant of the  USS Anchorage (LSD 36) where i realized i had become a mariner. Commander Arthur St. Clair Wright, the commanding officer, and i had a symbiotic relationship and shared our love of the sea. If i could pick one job in the myriad of jobs i have had over 75 years, i would pick that job to do for my entire life. i was at home. i was a mariner.

The feelings were confirmed when i spent two years as the Weapons Officer of the USS Okinawa (LPH 3)  under Captain (later Admiral) Dave Rogers and Captain Roger Newman.

Captain Boyle’s complement was the perfect way to leave that life behind, even though it was bittersweet.

Then on this past Friday, the thoughts of the sea returned. Bob Schoultz, a retired Navy SEAL captain and the son of Vice Admiral Dutch Schoultz who passed away last year, went to his car before joining us at the nineteenth hole after our round of golf. He had a number of golf items he had saved from his father’s memorabilia to share with us.

Bob is a leader and continues to inspire and teach others in the ways of good leadership. His father is a legend in Navy aviation. i have the greatest respect for both of them.

Bob looked into the box he brought from the car as he asked, “Who is the oldest of you surface guys?” Having two years on my close friend and fellow retired SWOS commander Rod Stark, i ‘fessed up.

Bob handed me a cap.

The circle is rather complete now: Coleridge, the albatross, Bill Holland, Max Lasell, Richard Butts, Art Wright, Dave Rogers, Roger Newman, Frank Boyle, the two Schoultz’s, and:

One morning last week, i awoke grousing about all of the things i had to do. i complained about not having the time to read for a couple of hours, workout to combat aging for an hour or so, record all my records, write more on my book, yadda yadda yadda. Dark day, feeling bad, feeling old.

So i started with my honey-do list. You know, that never-ending list which is continually interrupted by more instant honey-do’s and require you to do about twenty other tasks to get to the one she wants you to do for her immediately. This time, i put a twist in it and put what we both wanted done at the top of the list.

i began with replacing a wood-rotted, termite-weakened beam in the trellis outside our master bedroom. This included beginning a sanding and scraping the entire trellis in preps for painting. Next i worked on our tomato-strawberry, herbs, and onion garden boxes. Then i planted some more gladiola bulbs in large planter boxes. Finally, i began to repaint the crowns of the posts on our stucco fence. Our next door neighbors to the northwest decided to invite Willie Wonka to visit and painted their house and their side of the fence, including my side of the post a bright yellow.

There are a couple of stories here but i will bypass them for now.

The point is i worked all day. Nothing artsy-fartsy, nothing technically sophisticated. Just work. When it was concluded, i felt…well, satisfied. i wasn’t trying to influence anyone to do anything to make me some money or prestige or power. i was just doing something useful and working up a bit of a sweat. It reminded me of long, long days working the well deck of the USS Anchorage (LSD 36) with loads and unloads. It reminded me of digging graves in Cedar Grove Cemetery in the hot and humid summer days. It reminded me of mowing the adjacent acre yards of J. Bill and Bessie Lee Frame and Fred and Ruby Cowan across Castle Heights from our house.

Satisfaction, a good tired.

It seems to me such enjoyment, such satisfaction of just doing good work has been mostly dismissed by the way we have progressed (sic).

i thought about making a point or two here about some important things. i put all of that stuff behind me, forgot about dealing with other people in the thorny miasma of relationships we have created, and just put my effort in doing something productive.

That is enough to make it a good day for an old man. It’s too bad we all can’t have those kind of good days.

Thanks, Judy.

Judy tagged me on Facebook so i would see Cathy Alley’s post of Kate Smith singing “God Bless America.”

For those of you who did not see it, here is a version taken from one of “The Kate Smith  Show” videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zF7a0wB-Lg

After we got our first television, about a 15-inch screen that sat in the corner of our living room across from the front door, black and white screen, of course, i was impressed with Kate’s singing.

At first, i didn’t know about Kate’s show. We didn’t have a television. My only awareness of television was provided by Roberta Padgett. The Padgett’s lived to the north of their lot that separated our house from theirs on Castle Heights Avenue. The Padgett’s were one of the first to get a television on our block, around 1950. Roberta would invite me over to their den, which i considered an incredible place to have as our den was about half a dozen years away from reality, to watch “The Howdy Doody Show” in the afternoon.

Because of that, Roberta was the girl with whom i fell in love.

But in 1954, we caught up with the Jones’s…or at least the Padgett’s, when we got our own television.

i would turn Kate on when i got home from school . Her half-hour show came on at 3:30 p.m. on WSM, the only channel we initially had in Lebanon, at least what we could capture on our small but still ugly roof antenna. The shows consisted of what WSM considered the best of the three only networks, NBC, CBS, and ABC. Before Kate, there was only the Native American logo and silence (although i think i remember a sound as well, like a hum). As i recall (not necessarily a reliable source), the Native American chief’s image was accompanied  by the logo of National Life and Accident Insurance, the station’s owner.

But for me, Kate was only a time killer before what Roberta had shown me: “The Howdy Doody Show” where my favorite parts were the “Tons of Funs” silent movies, Flub A Dub, and Clarabell. Phineas T. Bluster was an object of my disdain. Buffalo Bob was a bit of a wuss in leather shirts with western fringe. Howdy was just too damn cheery. Chief ThunderThud endeared himself to me with his expression of awe, “Kowabunga.”

Of course, i lost my heart to Princess SummerFallWinterSpring, one if not the first of many loves in my life i dreamed about in television. The real life Roberta had competition.

Then at 5:00 p.m., i was riveted to Ruff ‘n Ready, the white whiskered guy in a cowboy outfit because he introduced the daily oater. Roy Rogers and Bob Steele ignited my desire to be a cowboy after my father introduced me to Hopalong Cassidy, who started that dream. Hopalong rode Topper into my life on Castle Film’s 8 mm film “Bar 20 Rides Again.”

i know all this stuff about Hoppy, not because i remember so well but because the three-inch square box with Hoppy holding his gun on the front sits on my bookshelf.

When Daddy would set up the portable movie screen to show home movies to us and whatever relatives might join us, nearly always Aunt Bettye Kate and Uncle Snooks, the children would demand we watch Hoppy and Woody Woodpecker first. He usually relented for one of the two.

i don’t recall Hoppy ever being on Ruff ‘n Ready’s show.

Now to prove my recall is faulty, the next afternoon highlight i remember was “The Mickey Mouse Club.” i am not sure what happened, but Kate, Howdy, or Ruff ‘n Ready must have fallen off the screen. My post school, pre-supper world was focused on that show, not because i enjoyed the cartoons, or much of the rest of the show, but my love was now squandered on two television dreams: the aforementioned Princess SummerFallWinterSpring and Annette. i kept wishing i could go to summer camp and capture Annette’s heart and whisk her away from that wimpy Skip — meanwhile in New York, one of my best friends of all time who i would not meet for another six or seven years,  Alan Hicks, was head over heels for Darlene.

But alas, my joy was ended when the news took over. John Cameron Swayze told it like it was without bias, a lost art, on “The Camel News Caravan.” i rejected the idea of listening to the news. Hmm, old habits have returned. But i did like John’s Timex commercials. i particularly remember them tying a Timex wrist watch to an outboard propeller and whirling the boat around the water for a couple of laps. After the boat docked, John took the watch off the prop and declared, “It takes a licking, but it keeps on ticking.”

Then it was supper time. Not much better things in my memory than Mother’s suppers. The fare varied but every supper seemed to include her legendary biscuits and fresh tomatoes.

It seems my every weekday during the school year from 1950 to 1956 was highlighted by afternoon television. This is a faulty memory of course. There were other things going on, but the way i remember it, even though she created only a nuisance of waiting for MY shows, Kate started it all.

i am aware of the current displeasure with Kate and her other racially incorrect songs creating the latest rancor. i also know any comment i might make about that will be taken as offensive by one side or the other, perhaps both, and i wonder why we insist on having two sides , or three sides, or exponentially more sides, even today.

All i know is i did not infer any negatives on those afternoons. Kate was part of it.

God Bless America.

Seems to me we used to do complex things with simple tools and now, we do simple things with complex tools.

Not much difference in the people though. There are still good un’s,  and mostly good un’s with a little bad thrown in, and bad un’s with a little good in ’em, and worser un’s, and some that just need to be wiped out with no resort to a legal system. Pretty much like people have always been.

And we keep trying to fix it, coming up with ideas that will fix it for us but pretty much screw it up for a lot of folks who aren’t us or like us.

Seems to me we need to get back to fixing complex things with simple tools, like behaving ourselves. Like dealing with people with compassion and understanding, not drawing lines in the sand, not throwing rocks over the wall.

Now that would be different.